“Are you half-dead after a complicated journey?”[1]

when
I was a girl a girl a little monster frightening to be small or a girl a small
girl are you a girl? or small in the world? I would think to myself when I was a girl are you real and small and a
girl in the world? on your way through the day some day any day so plain and near
or far from home so safe not safe for a girl little girl in the frightening world
a girl I would think a mon- strous girl this girl that is if she was a girl a small
world girl who strayed one day from her path in the world strayed in the world
like a girly little girl little monster girly girl so small and unfurled

[1] Bhanu Kapil, from Incubation:
A Space for Monsters

Posted 07/07/15

published in the 2014 anthology, Lilac City Fairytales, ed. Sharma Shields